subscribe to style file blog via RSSFound In Translation
November 18, 2009
Fashion and art may spawn some serious enfants terribles, but Zorya Fine Art founder Zorianna L. Altomaro had a different creative type in mind. “We were looking for somebody both internationally sophisticated and genuine,” the art entrepreneur explained on tapping designer Brian Reyes for a cross-cultural fashion-meets-art mash-up. The Colombian designer worked with Altomaro to curate an exhibition of works by the Ukrainian artist Oksana Mas. “I thought about curating in colors because that’s how I think about my collections,” Reyes said at the exhibit’s celebratory cocktail fête at the Ukrainian Museum last night.
In return, Mas got to try her hand at fashion. A major player in Russia’s booming art scene, the Ukrainian artist has been working with Reyes through a translator on prints for his Fall 2010 collection that will include a pattern inspired by her shadow paintings. With Spanish, English, and Ukrainian floating around the design studio, was it a case of lost in translation? “We actually understood each other pretty well,” Reyes said. “Plus, I signal with my hands a lot. You’d be surprised on how much you can convey just using your body.”
tags: Zorianna L. Altomaro
Lanvin’s Big Business, Zac’s Lower Line, And More…
November 18, 2009
Alber Elbaz got a present: “a capital injection estimated in the tens of millions of euros” for Lanvin. We’ll take two. [WWD]
Monday night’s CFDA/Vogue Fashion Fund winner Sophie Théallet runs a tight ship. In her home-cum-studio in Brooklyn, it’s just a three-person show. Four including the baby. [WWD]
Zac Posen is heading to double-digit territory. His new, lower-priced line, Z Spoke (get it?), will only be available at Saks, but prices start at $78. “Chic sportswear should be at this price point,” the designer reasoned. We couldn’t agree more. [WWD]
No pants in Paris—it’s the law. An age-old rule forbidding women to wear trousers—unless they’re “on a bicycle or holding it by the handlebars”—has resurfaced. Carla Bruni-Sarkozy better get out of town. [Telegraph]
Claudia Schiffer is almost definitely pretty sure she’s going to go into fashion design. “I would love to do cashmere…but I’d love to do something a bit more price-friendly…. Or I could imagine doing handbags.” Low-end cashmere handbags. Sounds great. [WWD]
tags: Alber Elbaz, Carla Bruni-Sarkozy, Claudia Schiffer, Lanvin, Zac Posen
Lerario And Geller Are A Match Made In Retail Heaven, And Otherwise
November 18, 2009
I’m sure I shot Ana Lerario a quizzical look when she told me that one of her new retailers for the upcoming season is Fred Segal Men’s. Was there something she wasn’t letting on? Not quite. It turns out that the West Coast mega-boutique has decided that its merchandising could benefit from a romantic gesture. (Hey, why not?) Come March, the store will sell the designer’s collection Lerario Beatriz right next to that of her husband (and CFDA/GQ winner) Robert Geller. “We have a very similar sensibility—kind of melancholy,” Lerario explained. “Robby’s darker than I am and I’m more romantic but my girl would definitely have a crush on his boy.” This spring, that sweetly brooding beauty will be wearing Lerario’s first original prints, including a long-sleeved day dress, a lovely T-shirt, and an empire-waist maxi in a painterly floral—the last just begging for a ramble through the English countryside. Elsewhere, she does for metallic jacquard what she did for brocade last season—that is, treat it totally unpretentiously, cutting it into a trenchcoat and T-shirt that are the color of tarnished silver. “I love taking clothes that should be worn at night and making them for day,” she said. “I like sequins before seven o’clock.”
tags: Lerario Beatriz, Robert Geller
On Our Radar: Joseph Leopard Coat
November 17, 2009
They say leopards don’t change their spots—and that’s fine with me, because I am obsessed with them. I’ve been collecting leopard-print pieces for a few years, but I never managed to find the perfect coat. Until now. I love this extra-soft rabbit-fur piece at Joseph, either to pair with slouchy boyfriend jeans on the weekends or with my sleek, skinny J Brands for work. Printed fur can be tricky—either too flashy or too cheap-looking—but this one’s just right. Fair warning, though: It doesn’t look cheap because, well, it isn’t.
$1,450, available at Joseph, 816 Madison Ave., NYC, (212) 570-0077.
tags: Joseph, Leopard Coat
Viv Will Survive
November 17, 2009
“It’s very sad, but English fashion will survive, and be stronger,” Vivienne Westwood said of Luella’s recent closing. “It’s a bit of a cautionary tale for all involved on tightening up the business side of things—but for that conversation, we will need several hours.” Given that we caught the flame-haired designer at her Spring ‘10 Anglomania showing at Selfridges, leisure was hardly an option. All of London, it seems, is debating whether or not “cool” is enough to base a business on, and the jury, for better or worse, is hung. But whatever the verdict, the mood has been grim, making Dame Westwood’s energetic, colorful show a welcome shot in the arm. Dionne Bromfield, Amy Winehouse’s 13-year-old goddaughter, sang a couple of ditties to open, playing to a crowd that included Julia Restoin-Roitfeld, Sadie Frost, Lady Victoria Hervey, Dinos Chapman, and Tracey Emin. Westwood herself was front-row, too, watching models like Daisy Lowe take the runway.
“It’s the best of all things British,” Frost said afterward. She also had a few encouraging words for Luella. Few have forgotten that Frost’s company, Frost French, shuttered a while back, too, only to rise again this year and reopen with a much-celebrated London store. “It’s doable. A little bit of pain and learning, and you can come back stronger and better.”
tags: Dionne Bromfield, Luella, Vivienne Westwood
Yea, Nay, or Eh: Dakota Fanning Gives Us The Slip
November 17, 2009
On a red carpet populated with the likes of Robert Pattinson, Kristen Stewart, and Taylor Lautner (vampire, moody starlet, and werewolf, respectively), the best strategy for a secondary star may be not to show up at all. Not so Dakota Fanning. We barely recognized the teen thespian at New Moon’s L.A. premiere (Fanning plays a pint-size but sinister bloodsucker), but that’s only because her slick-straight locks and grown-up poise are such a far cry from the adolescent Marc Jacobs model we once knew. We love the peekaboo lace Valentino dress but wonder if the camp that denounced Miley Cyrus’ precocious turn in Vanity Fair will find it too risqué for Miss Fanning. She may look like a mini Gwyneth Paltrow, but she’s still only 15. What do you think of her nighttime look? Leave your comments below.
tags: Dakota Fanning, Kristen Stewart, Robert Pattinson, Taylor Lautner
Choo Times Two
November 17, 2009
Those that missed the Jimmy Choo for H&M launch this past weekend are in luck. We hear the frenzy-inducing collection will be restocked at three NYC stores (34th and Seventh, Herald Square, and 51st and Fifth) on the morning of November 19. Consider yourself warned.
tags: Jimmy Choo
Lindsay Gets Confused, Alber Gets Pinned, And More…
November 17, 2009
Cleared up: Lindsay Lohan is not designing jewelry for Pascal Mouawad, despite Lohan’s red-carpet claims stating otherwise. [WWD]
Speaking of celebrity lines, Robin Givhan employs the best analogy yet for the trend: “I can’t imagine Donna Karan saying I’m going to cut an album because her friends say she can sing karaoke.” Zing! [WWD]
More news on the Ridley Scott Gucci movie: Rumors that Angie and Leo are set to star are still just rumors, but we’re looking at an early 2011 release. That’s not too far, right? [WWD]
Lanvin’s Alber Elbaz is receiving an honorary medal with an impressively long name: the Grande Médaille de Vermeil de la Ville de Paris. Past recipients have included Valentino and Gianni Versace. [WWD]
Recession scorecard: Paparazzi pics are going for peanuts. Those in the know claim the infamous Britney Spears head-shaving shot would only go for $100,000 in the current economy, versus the $300,000 it fetched in 2007. Brangelina pics, however, do not depreciate. [The Daily Beast]
tags: Alber Elbaz, Donna Karan, Gucci, Lanvin, Lindsay Lohan, Pascal Mouawad, Robin Givhan, Valentino, Versace
Simon Doonan, Conehead To Be?
November 17, 2009
The holidays are fast approaching, so ’tis the season…to dread the throngs of holiday shoppers in midtown. But a quick visit to Barneys should set even the grumpiest gifter to rights. The store’s holiday windows, unveiled last night at a party hosted by creative director Simon Doonan, Vanity Fair’s Graydon Carter, and Saturday Night Live honcho Lorne Michaels, are a riot: They celebrate 35 years of SNL.
Papier-mâché tributes to the iconic characters of days past and present line the windows, from Gilda Radner’s Roseanne Roseannadanna to Kristen Wiig’s accidentally fashion-forward Gilly (that hair, so Louis Vuiton Spring ‘10!) to Mike Myers’ Coffee Talk host Linda Richman. (Funny, we’d have thought she’d prefer Loehmann’s.) Current cast members Andy Samberg, Seth Meyers, and Abby Elliott milled around the party, joined by upcoming host Joseph Gordon-Levitt, alum Rachel Dratch, and new SNL in-law Elisabeth Moss of Mad Men (she married cast member Fred Armisen last month). Host Doonan gushed about his love for the show, which he’s followed ever since the late seventies. Were his windows a fan letter-cum-audition tape, we wondered? Certainly he wouldn’t turn a cameo down. “Absolutely, I’d do it in a heartbeat!” he said. “Being on the show is the ultimate honor.” Well, a Barneys homage ain’t so bad either.
tags: Gilda Radner, Lorne Michaels, Simon Doonan
T Minus 72 Hours: A Sneak Peek At The Victoria’s Secret Show
November 16, 2009
Alessandra Ambrosio has walked Victoria’s Secret’s Fashion Show so many times—eight, maybe nine—she’s lost count. But she won’t forget this Thursday, when she’s scheduled to open the show, an honor she’s never enjoyed before. Her outfit? A neon chartreuse bra-and-undies set and a pair of matching wings made from a single laser-cut piece of plastic by Victoria’s Secret first-timer Alexander Koutny. “I’m really excited, but I’m really nervous,” the model told us. “I consider it the biggest show on earth.”
Koutny, a Central Saint Martins grad who was born in Johannesburg, is a bit more understated than the Brazilian model, but it’s safe to say that the New York-based designer, who was recruited by the show’s stylist Charlotte Stockdale, is every bit as thrilled. He worked with Marjan Pejoski when the London designer put Björk in her infamous swan dress for the Oscars, but despite that experience, he told us, “I’ve never done something so theatrical, so bold. It just came out.” Of his 15 initial “Star Trooper” designs, six or seven will make it into the show. Koutny describes his own luxury ready-to-wear as “organic, but modern,” and a quick perusal of his Web site revealed sculptural yet wearable dresses, coats, and separates in the Maria Cornejo school. So where did the inspiration come from? “My mom was a closet Trekkie,” he said.
We witnessed Miranda Kerr being fit in his rocket cone shoulder rigging over the weekend, and we couldn’t help but notice there was something very Fall 2009 about the outfit. “It’s not the tennis ball shoulder,” Koutny said, referring to the influential Balmain collection. “It’s the rocket shoulder.” Kerr, for her part, reported that it felt empowering to be wearing launch rockets on her shoulders. “You better watch out, I may go flying off into the audience and this time I won’t need wings,” she laughed. “You can quote me on that.”
